sa.global Featured in Briefing Magazine

Jaana Nylund to lead the Nordics team at sa.global as Country Manager

Jaana Nylund to lead the Nordics team at sa.global as Country Manager

sa.global Featured in Briefing Magazine

In a recent interview with Briefing Magazine, Stephen James, CEO and founder of sa.global discussed the opportunity for law firms to take advantage of cloud-based enterprise resource planning and client relationship management alongside, Whit McIsaac, CEO Americas, at sa.global. In this interview, we hear why our professional service-focused business is the perfect fit for LexisOne, formerly owned by LexisNexis.

Built on the award-winning Microsoft Dynamics 365 platform, LexisOne is a fully integrated business management suite providing practice management, time and billing, accounting, and human resource management capabilities. sa.global has provided ERP and CRM solutions for some time and when reflecting on our history, CEO and founder Stephen James explained,“It was around eight years ago that we first decided to focus on professional services as one specific industry. Other companies in our area tended to be generalists, and we knew that we needed a different strategic direction to stand out from the crowd.”

Working within professional services is complex, and law firms represent the most specific requirements due to how the legal sector is structured. A platform such as this offers law firms more than the traditional practice management offerings that have dominated until now. In this interview, we find out exactly how sa.global intend to contribute to the LexisOne product in a way that its former owner could not.

In 2016, the launch of cloud-based Microsoft Dynamics 365 saw ERP combined with CRM alongside other business functions such as customer service and human capital management. ERP became Finance and Operations, and CRM rebranded as Customer Engagement. As an out-of-the-box solution this was revolutionary, but it didn’t come with the full needs of the legal sector in mind. Independent vendors were encouraged to build on top of the cloud-based Microsoft Dynamics 365 platform. In this sector, 360 Vertical Solutions, owned by Whit McIsaac, emerged as a key player, building solutions (known as Cloud embed) on top of the Dynamics 365 customer engagement platform.

In July 2018, a unique opportunity arose and sa.global merged with 360 Vertical Solutions, who bring with them 30 years of experience of law firm CRM processes and over 40 customers across the USA, Europe and Asia Pacific. On the merger, Whit McIsaac, now CEO Americas for sa.global, stated,“We integrated our Legal360 CRM and relationship intelligence product suite, and immediately also launched the implementation and support offer for the legal market globally.”

Although an already fascinating merger, there was more to come in shaping a future product for the legal sector. Only 45 days into this new and exciting merger, another opportunity came into play – this time with LexisOne. In a position to offer a revamped product for the legal market that had been carefully crafted over a five-year period, that would sit on top of Microsoft Dynamics 356 Finance and Operations was an opportunity that could not be
ignored and that would ultimately lead to sa.global becoming a heavy presence within the legal sector. Commenting on the LexisOne product, Stephen James, CEO and founder of sa.global stated,“Typically, law firms have had to stitch together multiple best-of-breed systems – specialist solutions – across their office networks.”

The key difference with an end to end alternative is a single platform, which operates across business functions and unifies international and systematic silos. This consistency of platform across organisations will benefit the whole business and see greater efficiency in the training of lawyers on technology alongside more general use within data management. Systems that are familiar and easy to use generally enjoy better traction and faster uptake during the digital transformation of a business.

Stephen James, CEO and founder of sa.global stated,“With the Dynamics platform on which Legal360 and LexisOne alike are based, you don’t find yourself in a situation where you’re jumping in and out of different systems to complete a process. Everything, from finance to sales and marketing, interoperates within the Microsoft Office suite of applications, in the same way that CRM did in the past. And when it’s time to report on work you aren’t pulling data in from as many sources, so the information is also more current, accurate and consistent.”

Discussing the platform, James also adds,“It’s a platform for the entire organisation, with intelligence and communication tools that can be leveraged as required for the task or problem in hand.”

One of only 12 global independent software vendor (ISV) partners, sa.global’s Legal360 IP has been certified for Microsoft field sales. sa.global are excited with this new offering and as we continue to work on research and development and feedback to Microsoft on the experience of our clients across the globe, we look forward to creating products that are even more effective than they are already.